That said, my latest notebook has gone slightly rogue, with paperclips, post-it notes and even a rubber band being used to try to highlight sections that I must try to remember to return to. As a writer’s tool, it has become far too scrappy to be effective and has – if I am being honest – begun to drive me crazy. About to start a new one and armed with this post as inspiration, I decided to get hacking.

Here is my new notebook, with its lovely leather cover:

There are few things more appealing than a new notebook as far as I am concerned, so be warned, if you are of the same opinion, the next photograph could leave you feeling a little giddy:

Lovely. The friend who gave me the notebook was worried that they had picked up square-ruled paper by mistake, but this has turned out to be very fortuitous, as it made what is about to follow much easier.

First, I removed the cover:

Then I split the notebook into sections. I reckoned I needed five with the number of things I am now working on:

Then I got my new craft knife ready. I suppose I should also have used some kind of mat, but in the absence of one, an old copy of expat magazine Metropolis worked pretty well:

For a stationery addict like myself, working two days a week in an Aeon department store has been dangerous. They sell everything and it is all pretty wonderful.

The next stage of the hack was to make some pencil markers:

The very eagle-eyed amongst you will notice that I messed it up a bit first time around and had to re-do. No problem though, it was easily amended. Then began the fiddliest, the messiest and yet – as with so much in life – the most satisfying part, cutting the paper. It was best to do about 5-6 pages at a time and to keep lining them up as I went, as the ruled lines didn’t always match up through the book.

Here is what I ended up with:

Very pretty, I am sure you will agree. If the rainy season is about to begin where you are too, you could do worse on an evening cooped up indoors, with a pot of tea on the go and something soothing to listen to, than to do the same.